Contact radius of stamps in reversible adhesion

Abstract

A mechanics model is developed for the contact radius of stamps with pyramid tips in transfer printing. This is important to the realization of reversible control of adhesion, which has many important applications, such as climbing robots, medical tapes, and transfer printing of electronics. The contact radius is shown to scale linearly with the work of adhesion between the stamp and the contacting surface, and inversely with the plane-strain modulus of the stamp. It also depends on the cone angle and tip radius of the stamp, but is essentially independent of details of the tip geometry.